The want of such a congress has already been the subject of much serious reflection with many persons, whose position and duties oblige them to recognize the necessity of union and cooperation in carrying out the various good works in which they are engaged. If we are truly imbued with the spirit of our holy religion, we should not only be far from grudging the communication of our knowledge and experience to our brethren, but should rather burn to impart it, to make it profitable to the church at large; and we are convinced that in no other way could this be so effectually done as in a congress modelled upon those of Belgium and Germany.
The form of their congress is precisely that to which we are well accustomed here in organized assemblies. All projects are first referred to particular committees and put in proper shape to be presented before the whole congress, where they are quickly disposed of according to their merits. The statutes or rules under which they meet are of such a character as to produce perfect harmony in their discussions, and the subjects which are admitted as proper for deliberation and deserving of encouragement are just such as the good of religion demands attention to and united action upon at our hands.
Not a few of the first scientific men in the United States are Catholics. True science must necessarily be in harmony with the true religion. It has been the fashion of late to consider that they are in no way related to or dependent one upon the other.
The doctrine of Luther, that reason must be left out of account in religion, and that its judgments are not to be sought for nor relied upon in matters of faith, has resulted in turning scientific men out of the church.
Men will reason, will claim and use their reason as they should, by divine right; and if you divorce reason from religion, what wonder that they will accept the decision and look upon science as a department of human knowledge and belief over which religion has no control? The Catholic Church has never professed this degrading doctrine; on the contrary, she has stoutly condemned all propositions implying it in any sense; but still, Catholic men of science must associate with scientific infidels as scientific men; they must correspond, deliberate, examine, and discuss questions of vital importance with them, who make no hesitation in assuming premises and forming theories the conclusions of which are contradictory to faith. We are not here accusing our brethren, or casting suspicion upon their orthodoxy. What we intend to imply is simply this, that for want of fraternal co-operation and mutual recognition and encouragement the false principle we have alluded to above is gradually gaining ascendency in the popular as well as in the scientific mind. Had we a "Catholic Academy" composed of the men who stand high in intellectual culture and scientific research, such an "academy" as the European congresses are now striving to found, we should be able to present a bold front in the arena of science, and compel attention to its true principles and to the fact of their consonance with the teachings of faith. Thus a right arm of power would be given to the church from a source which now practically ignores it. It has been our pleasure to meet in different cities of the Union with many men, devout Catholics, whose names would grace an academic roll of first class merit. Indeed, and we say it knowingly, in every profession—in philosophy, medicine, law, geology, as well as in the army and navy, Catholics rank with the foremost. What they need, and what the church needs on their account, we say again, is union, opportunity, and mutual acquaintance and support. It is impossible to estimate what influence a body of such men would exert, or with what respect for our holy religion they would inspire the American public.
Neither must it be forgotten that the church alone possesses an universal and complete system of Christian philosophy. For the want of this, Protestantism has in the main abandoned all attempts to reconcile the deductions of reason with the dogmas of revelation. Hence, its systems of dogmatic theology are extremely jejune and discordant. Let us bring this fact before the minds of the intellectual men of our age and country, and at once Protestantism as a reasonable system of religion must fall below their contempt.
But the institution of a Catholic academy must be consequent upon the foundation of a Catholic university. We have some good schools, where a more scholarly knowledge of the classics can be acquired than in professedly Protestant colleges, but they surpass us in all other branches of science and intellectual culture. And the reason is plain. Their professorial chairs are filled by men of superior attainments, whose services are secured by good salaries.
Their standard for graduation is, however, extremely low compared to that required by the European colleges and universities. Indeed, most of our Protestant and Catholic colleges, too, accord the diploma to all their students, irrespective of their merits. We ourselves have been called upon, by a graduate of one of the oldest and most respectable Protestant colleges in the country, to translate his diploma into English, that the old folks at home might know what it meant. We need to raise our own colleges to a higher standard than they now possess, and to offer to our men of talent the means of completing the imperfect education of an ordinary college course. To do this we must have an university whose requirements for matriculation shall demand a rigid examination, in which the candidate must come off thoroughly successful; whose chairs shall be filled with first-class professors, and which shall possess an ample endowment for its purposes.
This great work, which is the hope of all the scholars in the country, can only be carried out by united effort on the part of the episcopate and the wealthy laity, and a congress would be a most fitting opportunity for bringing the matter to a definitive and practical conclusion. Great men in council will do great things, and generous souls will be stimulated to emulate examples of heroic sacrifice. It is a word to the wise.
Of all the departments of public instruction, the press needs amongst us the improvement, encouragement, and sanction which a congress is calculated to give. Think of Belgium, with only 5,000,000 inhabitants, supporting over fifty Catholic periodicals, and possessing numerous societies for the publication of cheap religious books and pamphlets! Our Catholic population of the United States is at least equal in number to that of the whole of Belgium. Yet with all our numbers and means we have not one daily paper under Catholic supervision, a most important work, to the establishment of which one of the first efforts of a Catholic congress with us should be directed. Those who complain of our Catholic press, and make invidious comparisons between the literary merit of our periodicals and our neighbors', should remember that editors are professional men, and not to be obtained for the wages of a day laborer; and that a first-class periodical must have a first-class circulation. A congress of editors would tend to elevate the tone of the Catholic press, and its voice would stimulate all classes to greater effort in promoting a more generous diffusion of this kind of literature. An increased circulation would enable the conductors of our journals to pay for original contributions, and engage the services of first-class writers; an outlay which very few of them have now the means of making.